I have a need to make a cut along the bottom of 12 foot wide sliding barn door plywood (T-111) siding - to remove a section of the plywood because the very bottom is rotted and I need to replace the bottom 2 feet or so (they should have painted the very bottom - it was sucking up moisture over time. The plywood sits inside an aluminum frame - aluminum on each side, fastened to horizontal 2x6's or 2x8's (can't remember) under the T-111. I figured I'd complete the cut at the ends with an oscillating saw so as not to damage the aluminum frame.

Any ideas how to fasten a 12 foot length of EZ guide rails to an upright surface where the clamps can't get behind at the ends ... while still being able to run the saw along the rail?

I've included a picture of the barn. The door is open and slid to the left in this pic.

In the future I'll want to do something similar to trim the ends of stacked 2x12's flush when building horse stalls - this time with the guide rail going vertical rather than horizontal.

I would be tempted to just tack a 1x6 to the wall, offset from the cutline as needed, and make the cut with the saw base against the upper edge of the 1x. The screws would be in the waste portion. I needed to cut out a section of the T-111 on the gable end of my garage and that's what I did, the thickness of the 1x provided more than enough support for the edge of the base. I took a scoring cut first so I didn't wind up with a lot of splintering.

Years ago, I made a couple of metal brackets like what's shown in the pic. Slid them into the sides of the track; hung the track; made the cut.

I've also set the track on a couple of pieces of wood to allow me to slide the track down a bit if the cut is longer than the track. (Pic 3)

What I do now is slide in the slotted, triangular piece of baltic ply, shown on the left in pic 4 (remove the plastic handle first), into the edge of the EZ track and fasten it in place with a washered screw thru the slot. I've used this set up for horiz, vert, and diagonal cuts.
Rick

What I do now is slide in the slotted, triangular piece of baltic ply, shown on the left in pic 4 (remove the plastic handle first), into the edge of the EZ track and fasten it in place with a washered screw thru the slot. I've used this set up for horiz, vert, and diagonal cuts.
Rick